Today's jaunt was a sidle around Slovenia's only national park - Triglav. Triglav mountain, or "three-headed", owes its name to the shape as seen from the south-east side. It is also the name of the highest Slavic deity who was supposed to have its throne on the top of the mountain. Our aim today was to climb the neighbouring Vogel peak, at 1,922 meters.
Hourly checks of the weather forecast the night before convinced us to make an early start from Bistrica / Bled - so that we could make the entire five+ hour mountain climb and descent by the time the rain started up again... fingers, legs, arms and eyes were crossed. Off we set to catch a break in the weather and the first gondola up the mountain to around 1,500m (these people round here really knew how to start a hike!).
Something was wrong with Saroja. Nervous energy was emanating from her like a Mars bar next to a deep fryer. Fears started pouring out - would we be struck by lightning? Would we lose our way in the clouds? Would she freeze to death, alone on a mountain top, without that one last pash?* Would we be attacked by mountain trolls?? The trail started to get hairy - no path now, just rock face and steel cable, we had to drag ourselves upwards, hand over fist, between the clouds, a foot at a time closer to the gods.
* No, she got that in London. She's all good now.
We were back in time for a leisurely lunch on the lake Bohinjsko dock, refuelling in the sun and happily feeling the rain start it's downward trickle, happy in the knowledge that, at least on this day, we had beaten Tlaloc at his game. We had fun feeding the fishes, seeing what bits out of our (overpacked) lunches they would eat - and funnily enough, they don't like cucumber! Although Matt's experiment showed they would eat saliva - when you have just been eating biscuits... haha ha hahaaa... yukky fishies, yukky!
Time to leave the wilds --civilisation was calling. Off to Ljubljana we tootled in our feisty little Ford Fiesta (don't forget the Style Climate) for an early birthday dinner for Saroja with some medicinal wine for the sore muscles and recently regenerated souls...
Matt's mobile phone kacked it's pants around a week ago. Great. And Inga's had its face smashed in by a travelator back in London. Double great. Now we were down to zero smartphones. Sigh. This makes things more difficult that it needs to be in 2015... yeah, yeah, physical maps and phones and Internet cafes, and steam engines and working in coal mines, whatevs'. So while Inga had a quiet day inside, Matt and Saroja went out into the mean streets of Ljubljana, busting down the doors of all the electronic outlets. Took a damn long time and about eight different shops, but we both ended up with nice new and shiny Samsung Galaxy Note 4s. Phew - world order was restored.
The next day Saroja had a date with a plane for the next leg in her European adventure in southern Croatia. We dropped her off at the airport, with teary farewells and hugs all round, then, 15 minutes down the road, the new mobile phone informed us that Saroja's flight to Dubrovnik was cancelled. It had been cancelled months ago, but Air Serbia didn't bother to tell Saroja, or the other fella in a state at the airport. Nice job team Air Serbia, classy, real classy.
Back to the airport we went to pick up the Queen of Fashion, and with a group cursing at the crappyness of Air Serbia, we started making new plans for Saroja to fly to London instead. This all gave us time for a nice vegan dinner in Ljubljana to top up on veges (which are hard to come by in the Balkans outside courgette, tomato and capsicum over saturated in oil) before a second farewell... move over Slovenian mountains, time to make room for some Austrian rock.
Hourly checks of the weather forecast the night before convinced us to make an early start from Bistrica / Bled - so that we could make the entire five+ hour mountain climb and descent by the time the rain started up again... fingers, legs, arms and eyes were crossed. Off we set to catch a break in the weather and the first gondola up the mountain to around 1,500m (these people round here really knew how to start a hike!).
The early morning view as we rose above the clouds: sailing over tree tops and watching the valley slowly disappear into the clouds, such a serene start to the upcoming day's hard exertion...
(yes, those are leggings on Saroja The Fashion Queen's head)
Something was wrong with Saroja. Nervous energy was emanating from her like a Mars bar next to a deep fryer. Fears started pouring out - would we be struck by lightning? Would we lose our way in the clouds? Would she freeze to death, alone on a mountain top, without that one last pash?* Would we be attacked by mountain trolls?? The trail started to get hairy - no path now, just rock face and steel cable, we had to drag ourselves upwards, hand over fist, between the clouds, a foot at a time closer to the gods.
* No, she got that in London. She's all good now.
Saroja made a joke about all of her trips and stories ending with - "and then I didn't do it". It was all coming out now. With a group hug and some gentle persuasion from Matt (and remembering the inspirational words of Saroja's current life guru, Jillian Michaels), she made it to the top. So far it had been a mountain of one half, hard yards and other gratuitous sports references.
We got there, all the way to the top at 1,922 metres... although that was only around 500-600m in height actually gained by flapping our legs, thanks to the magic starting gondola :) ... unfortunately, the clouds decided that this would be an opportune time for them to also visit their old mate Mountain Top, so for lunch we had an amazing view of clouds, clouds and more clouds, instead of Italy and beautiful mountains...!
Ahh well, you can't win them all, eh? Them hungry hippo tummies made short shift of the sammies though. Scoff scoff mmm mmmm mmmmm no time for a pretty photo Matt its eatey eatey time.
After successfully and safely climbing most of the way back down the beanstalk, Matt spied these lovely looking, and, most importantly, working chair lifts, that were just begging us to slide our weary backsides into them. Matt loves chair lifts, so this was his special treat (nothing to do with weary legs all round at all). Shouldn't have wimped out the last little bit, but, meh, what the 'ell, we're on holiday.
Time to leave the wilds --civilisation was calling. Off to Ljubljana we tootled in our feisty little Ford Fiesta (don't forget the Style Climate) for an early birthday dinner for Saroja with some medicinal wine for the sore muscles and recently regenerated souls...
Matt's mobile phone kacked it's pants around a week ago. Great. And Inga's had its face smashed in by a travelator back in London. Double great. Now we were down to zero smartphones. Sigh. This makes things more difficult that it needs to be in 2015... yeah, yeah, physical maps and phones and Internet cafes, and steam engines and working in coal mines, whatevs'. So while Inga had a quiet day inside, Matt and Saroja went out into the mean streets of Ljubljana, busting down the doors of all the electronic outlets. Took a damn long time and about eight different shops, but we both ended up with nice new and shiny Samsung Galaxy Note 4s. Phew - world order was restored.
The next day Saroja had a date with a plane for the next leg in her European adventure in southern Croatia. We dropped her off at the airport, with teary farewells and hugs all round, then, 15 minutes down the road, the new mobile phone informed us that Saroja's flight to Dubrovnik was cancelled. It had been cancelled months ago, but Air Serbia didn't bother to tell Saroja, or the other fella in a state at the airport. Nice job team Air Serbia, classy, real classy.
Back to the airport we went to pick up the Queen of Fashion, and with a group cursing at the crappyness of Air Serbia, we started making new plans for Saroja to fly to London instead. This all gave us time for a nice vegan dinner in Ljubljana to top up on veges (which are hard to come by in the Balkans outside courgette, tomato and capsicum over saturated in oil) before a second farewell... move over Slovenian mountains, time to make room for some Austrian rock.
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